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AUDREY
Everybody loves Audrey Hepburn – the wonderful Hollywood star who began her career playing small parts in British movies like THE LAVENDER HILL MOB and SECRET PEOPLE before she conquered the world with her ROMAN HOLIDAY. “I had two big breaks in that year,” Audrey says in this compelling documentary, which celebrates her life and career. She was in London in the early fifties dreaming of becoming a ballet dancer when she met Collette, the writer of “Gigi”, who suggested her for the role on Broadway. The same year she met Robert Wyler who was looking for an unknown to play the princess in ROMAN HOLIDAY and the rest as they say is history, especially after her Academy Award triumph at the age of 24.
Helena Coen tells Audrey’s incredible story from the beginning, when she was a young girl in an English boarding school before she went back to Holland during the war. She always longed to see her father with whom she had lost contact in 1939 and this desire had a huge effect on Audrey’s subsequent relationships with men.
Coen discovers some rare archive material with her family but her decision to use ballet dancers in order to highlight Audrey’s inner world is redundant. Still, an enjoyable film of a genuine star that reached iconic status thanks to films like BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY’S and MY FAIR LADY.
POSSESSOR
Brandon Cronenberg proves he has inherited a lot of the fantastical and the bizarre from his veteran father David. I first saw this imaginative sci-fi thriller at the recent London Film Festival and on a second viewing, I still found the labyrinthine plot as complex but ultimately rewarding.
The story of an agent named Voss (Andrea Riseborough), who works for a secretive organisation that uses brain-implant technology to inhabit other people’s bodies, thus allowing the company to commit assassinations for vast amounts of money…
The ultra-violent opening sequence focusing on the first of many gruesome killings suitably sets up the tone before Christopher Abbott enters the scene as the sympathetic Colin Tate, the next person to be “possessed”. Intriguing, mysterious and hugely atmospheric!
THE RINGMASTER
Soren Juul Petersen’ nightmarish film is based on the Nordic Noir thriller “Finale” and follows the story of two young women working on a late-night shift at a remote gas station in Denmark. The sporadic clients are from the eccentric and threatening kind before the women find themselves held captive by a sadistic ringmaster in front of an unseen audience…
Petersen’s intense film plays with time, and by inserting early on snippets of the women being tortured while they are still at the station, it certainly adds to the suspense. A circus of horrors, or torture porn if you like, in the spirit of films like HOSTEL and PARADISE LOST that keeps the tension going till the final credits.
NIMIC
Yorgos Lanthimos’ eagerly awaited follow up to his Oscar winning THE FAVOURITE is a little gem. An 11 minute 47 second short film about a professional cellist (Matt Dillon) whose life takes an unexpected turn when he asks a stranger (Daphne Patakia) for the time on the tube…
It is cleverly scripted by Lanthimos’ regular collaborator Efthimis Philippou. An utterly unpredictable and enjoyable film. See it and after 12 minutes watch it all over again! (MUBI)
FINDING STEVE MCQUEEN
This enjoyable heist comedy based on a true story affectionately recreates the early seventies. It is 1972 to be precise and a group of thieves prepare to steal $30 million from President Nixon’s secret fund secured in a Californian bank from illegal campaign contributions. The mastermind of the gang is Enzo Rotella (William Fichter) and one of his cousins Harry Barber (Travis Fimmel) – a Steve McQueen wannabe who loves BULLITT – is the driver…
The Steve McQueen references are fun while Fimmel is very effective as the star’s biggest fan but curiously for a heist movie it lacks tension.
MOTHRA
This is Ishiro Honda’s 1961 Japanese monster fantasy adventure that first introduced MOTHRA to the screen. A group of international explorers discover human life on Infant island despite numerous atomic bomb tests. The natives appear to be friendly until one of the exploders kidnaps a pair of tiny twin fairies and take them for public display (like they did to KING KONG) in a Tokyo theatre. Meanwhile, a giant egg on the island is about to burst…
Superb production values for this entertaining and colourful adventure which follows closely to Honda’s previous spectacular GODJILLA. (Blu-Ray from Eureka)
ROPES: The spirit of CUJO is alive and hungry for blood in this tense Spanish chiller about Athos, a Belgian Shepherd dog, who becomes rabid after being bitten by a bat. Meanwhile, Elena (Paula del Rio), a teenage quadriplegic girl is all alone in their remote country house struggling to survive against the odds…Jose Luis Montesinos’ perfectly crafted thriller benefits tremendously from del Rio’s intense and luminous performance.
THE END OF THE STORM: James Erskine, the celebrated documentary filmmaker of the recent BILLIE, returns to his ONE NIGHT IN TURIN territory with another triumphant football story. Jurgen Klopp, the German manager of Liverpool Football Club leads his team into an unexpected glory in one of the most difficult years of recent times. Filmed across the globe with some invaluable interviews this is a real treat for football fans.
OVERSEAS: Yoon Sung-A focuses her illuminating documentary on a training centre in Philippines, where a group of women are preparing for work abroad as domestic workers and through some role playing they begin to learn how to cope in difficult situations. A few have already some experience in working abroad in places such Doha and Dubai and warn the newcomers about certain difficulties and abuse. It is a sad film about desperate women forced by circumstances to leave their families and young children behind for work. (MUBI)
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